


You're the Tickle in My Throat, the Bloom in My Desert, the Vine Pulling Down My Wall

by gloss



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: AU - Bees, Alternate Universe - Apoidae, Body Horror, Galra are wasps, Lovesickness, M/M, OTP Feels, angsty bee wasps, beeith of a different color, cocoons, hanahaki disease au, or maybe bees
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-16
Updated: 2018-09-16
Packaged: 2019-07-08 05:00:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,580
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15923384
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gloss/pseuds/gloss
Summary: Keith's got a bad cough, an unconscious Shiro, and a strange species-instinct to build a nest of flowers. Otherwise, this is exactly like the end of s6/start of s7.





	You're the Tickle in My Throat, the Bloom in My Desert, the Vine Pulling Down My Wall

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Lunarium](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lunarium/gifts).



> [Pics of flower cocoons.](https://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2010/05/photogalleries/100510-bees-flower-sandwich-nests-pictures/) For science.
> 
> Thanks to L. for help and to Lunarium for incredibly inspirational prompts. I hope this pleases! ♥

The Black Lion is worried about him. Keith can feel its quizzical concern gently probing him.

"Forget about that," he says out loud. "Get us _back_ , please."

He's got Shiro's body and a distracted Lion and this fucking cough that won't quit. 

It's not snot that's coming up, either. He can't fool himself any longer about that. These are real goddamn flowers he's spitting out, bunches of petals, black and red and pink and white as Shiro's forelock. They litter the floor and stick to the controls.

He just has to make it back to the team. He has to get Shiro help. He'll deal with the cough later. 

*

Keith has had this cough for about as long as he can remember. Since the Garrison, at least. It comes and goes, but each time it returns, it's a little worse. He faked his way through a couple med-exams at the Garrison; after he left, he didn't need to fake anything. That was good, because the cough got a lot worse. He didn't know if it was contagious, or possibly his house had mold, or what. Regardless, the cough and his isolation fit together.

He understands now that his solitude was at least partly a Galra thing.

Galra are solitary and humans aren't. This much he learned from Kolivan. Galra are predators and parasites, and they only work together when it's the only choice. They swarm, they do not collaborate. By contrast, humans cooperate, and build, and protect each other.

"You've got a way better opinion of them than I do," he remembers telling Kolivan. "People really suck."

Kolivan just _hmm'd_. Keith wanted to press the point, but then he thought of the team, of Shiro, and decided he didn't feel like explaining why _they_ were exceptions and he was still right about people sucking. Kolivan has this way of listening silently but arguing with his eyes and flicks of his braid that Keith admires and despises in equal measure.

His cough went away while he was with Kolivan, aside from hacking wheezes that would bring him up out of sleep some nights, usually after a consultation briefing with the paladins. Most mornings, he didn't even remember; it was only the stains on the bedroll that reminded him. They were dark and wet, spread like opening flowers, or, if you were Kolivan, "arterial spray". 

During their trip, Krolia also talked about the solitary urges of the Galra. Everything they do tends to push toward withdrawal, she said, which made getting pregnant a huge adjustment. She had almost finished preparing the nest for Keith to be laid in, then left, when Pop intervened. 

"The what now?" Keith had to ask.

When Galra reproduce, they craft sturdy nests, either in the carcasses of their enemies or in hollows in the ground. The fertilized egg hatches alone, swaddled in leaves and viscera. Those who manage to survive are true Galra. When Galra die, if anyone cares, they are placed in similar nests and left to rot like compost.

Krolia's explanation left him with so many more questions. Most of them were variations on _why_ and _what the fuck?_

"They are where we go to change," she said. "Where you don't come back from, at least not the same."

He'd suspected that a lot of what Krolia was telling him was bullshit. Kind bullshit, well-intentioned (though to what end, he wasn't sure), but still bullshit. 

"If Galra are supposedly so solitary, then why'd you stay?" 

"Sometimes what we can do isn't what we need to do," she replied. Her face was downturned, her profile sharp in the firelight. "I knew to build that nest."

"How?"

Krolia looked at him then, not smiling (she hardly ever did), but kindly nonetheless. "Species-knowledge, I suppose. What did your father used to sing? Fish gotta swim, birds gotta fly."

A full-body memory swept through him: being tossed up in the air while Pop sang that dumb old song. Keith pulled his knees up to his chest, wrapping his arms around his legs and digging his chin down.

"I knew to make that nest," she continued, "But I _needed_ to be with your father. And you." She doused the fire then, so when she spoke again, he could only hear, not see. "I think you know what that's like. The contradiction."

He nodded and dug his fingers into the wolf's ruff.

The cough vanished entirely while he rode the whale. Keith didn't notice its absence until a few months had passed. Then, when he did mention it, Krolia frowned. "What sort of cough?" She touched the back of her hand to his forehead. "Are you feeling warm?"

"Good job," he told her and she grinned wide enough to show her canines. She truly had read every single book on human child-development and -rearing she could find. "That's the thing. I feel fine out here."

She nodded. "The atmosphere is pristine."

It was more than that, Keith imagined. He wasn't sure how much more, however, nor quite what that meant. The longer they spent out there, the less like _himself_ he felt. He liked the new guy, someone who continued to develop his Marmora training and learned about Galran subcultures and liberation movements (crushed, of course, but no less inspiring) from his mother and _played with his puppy_ , but that guy wasn't Keith.

Now Keith is that guy, but he's also Keith again. He knows that like he knows the weight of his knife in his hand and the Black Lion's thoughts—at a level below words, something like emotional muscle memory. He's Keith again because Shiro's here.

The cough's really bad now. Fighting someone to the near-death will do that, apparently. He alternates between urging the Black Lion onward and puking up half a lung with each cough. 

*

After Allura revives Shiro, Keith's joy is short-lived. Shiro slips back into sleep and there's nothing else to be done. There are no pods left over from the Castle, no life-support, and the Lions are very, very slowly recharging. 

"You don't look well," Allura says.

When Keith coughs into his hand, he crumples the petals that come up. "I'm fine."

"Keith, please."

"Are you coughing?" Krolia asks. To Allura, she says, "He has thoracic and respiratory issues at times."

Lance mutters something about _thorax?!_ but Hunk shushes him. 

Allura presses her hand to Keith's chest, then rears back, wincing.

"What? What did you _do?_ " Lance demands.

"Nothing!" Keith bends over, coughing; it hurts to talk. Krolia moves a little in front of him to block Lance.

"I'm all right." Allura smoothes back her hair and smiles tightly. "I'm sorry, everyone."

She replaces her hand and breathes out. White light gathers under her palm, then spreads. It encircles Keith and illuminates his torso.

"Man, that's gnarly," Hunk says, bracing his hands on his thighs so he can lean in for a better look. "That can't be good."

Pidge's glasses pick up the white glow and blank out her eyes. 

Tangled roots pierce Keith's lungs, weave in and out, squeeze them tight. There are flowering vines, too, and narrow stalks heavy with buds ready to bloom. The roots and vines echo the branching airways grotesquely, clogging them and choking them off. Everything, branch and stalk and blossom, swells, then shrinks, as Keith struggles to breathe in and out.

"That's not Galra, is it?" Lance asks Krolia. Her face is twisted up as she shakes her head _no_.

"Keith..." Allura is calm, speaking softly, but her expression is pinched tight. "Should I try to remove these?"

"No," he says. He has to drag himself upright. "Not now. I'll—" He coughs, and petals and leaves fly out. Each breath drives several knives that much deeper. He waits for the next cough to pass before finishing. "Later. We need to help Shiro first."

Allura glances at Shiro draped over Keith's lap. "Keith, I don't know what else..."

"We wait," Keith says as firmly as he can.

The paladins look at each other silently.

"We can't lose you," Lance says and Hunk nods rapidly. 

"Please," Krolia says, "Listen to my son. Respect his wishes."

Allura rises. "For now, we'll wait and see."

"Thank you," Keith says. 

*

With Shiro in his arms, Keith waits, but as it gets darker and the hours pass, there is not very much to see. 

Shiro sleeps against him, this heavy weight against Keith's chest, pressing Keith down, keeping him here. Each cough brings up more flowers, white and pink now. They drift over Shiro, stick to his cheeks, tangle in his hair. The night is cold and dark enough that Shiro's white hair faintly glows. A pink petal looks like a bruise, like the extension of Shiro's scar, before it peels off to join its fellow.

Another cough builds up, twisting him from the inside out, filling his throat. When Keith leans back to let it out, Shiro dips into the crook of his arm like they're in an old movie, done up in tuxes and glittering. Entire flowers spew out his mouth, dragging broken stems and serrated leaves. He swipes the back of his hand against his mouth. It comes away smeared in equal parts blood and yellow pollen.

In sleep, everything about Shiro is slack, heavier than usual, blank. He's not quite Shiro, more a mannequin with Shiro's face. Impersonal and distant, for all the weight in Keith's arms. He _is_ Shiro, Keith fights to remember that, but it's hard to believe. He could be any of those clones in their tubes, any sham, nowhere near what Keith needs.

"Allura," Keith says, when she returns in the middle of the night. "You have to help him. Please."

He's never seen her look so tired, so _sad_. "I've done all I can. I'm so sorry. I think that we—. _You_ need to think about what comes next."

He knows what she means. He tightens his hold on the Shiro-doll.

"All right," he says. "But I need some privacy."

After a searching look, the parentheses on her cheeks nearly glowing, Allura leaves them. Keith had expected an argument, had tried to imagine yelling despite the pain, but they're alone again. He lowers Shiro to the soft ground and sets to work gathering up the mess of flowers and leaves. He moves as quickly as he can, which doesn't feel nearly quick enough, spreading the flowers over Shiro from his boots upward. The Black Lion's interest pricks up now; its focus sharpens Keith's movements and determination.

His cough is constant. Thorns are coming up now, woody vines spiked with barbs and buds dragging out Keith's throat. His eyes sting and stream with the effort, until he can't exactly see what he's doing. It doesn't matter. Everything is a watercolor blur, white and pale purple slashed by streaks of vivid blood. He heaps the flowers up to Shiro's waist, then a little further, and pats them into place.

He pauses, wracked by his stomach heaving and what is left of his shredded lungs convulsing. To steady himself, he grabs hold of Shiro's shirt and vomits a torrent of enormous, globular white flowers. Big as babies' heads, a shower of miniature moons, they tumble over Shiro, finish cocooning him up to his neck. Their petals match his hair, an unearthly pale glow that's either beautiful or terrifying. A little of both.

"Leave his mouth free," Krolia murmurs.

"Mom?" Keith tries to see, but it's so dark and his eyes are stuck half-closed with sweat and tears.

She's across him, a little further down the length of Shiro's body. "I know what you're doing," she says. 

Despite everything, Keith laughs—shortly, painfully—at that. "I'm not sure _I_ do."

"Finish covering him," she continues, "But leave his mouth free. That's what you need to do."

They work together, scooping up the petals and layering them around Shiro's head, across his forehead and around his neck. He doesn't look impersonal any longer, at least so far as Keith can make out. He looks beautiful, and otherworldly, a lunar prince floating in the dusk on a river of flowers.

This is a funeral, isn't it? Where you go that you don't come back from.

Keith coughs continuously, shreds of petals and broken stems erupting with each exhale. Bent nearly in two, broken at the waist, he is speared through by the pain.

Squeezing his shoulder, whispering something in the language he still hasn't wholly learned, Krolia departs. Keith leans all his weight on Shiro's chest and tries to say Shiro's name, but his voice is gone, his breath right behind it. 

_Please_ , Keith thinks, and prays, and needs. It's all he can think and feel, maybe all he's ever really felt: this hollow, ever-blooming _need_ for Shiro to live and be well and look at him with soft eyes. He has done this so many times, however, asking the universe for help, that he must be out of luck by now. Shiro's been returned to him more times than anyone, let alone Keith, deserves.

His throat constricts and pain corkscrews through the middle of his chest. Keith tries to move away, tries to spare Shiro, but he coughs before he can. 

A single huge petal, the size of Keith's hand, unfurls from his bloody mouth and floats over Shiro's chin. It alights on his mouth and shrinks, going concave, as Shiro breathes in. Keith falls forward, wheezing. The petal lifts to adhere to his lips.

He has never kissed Shiro. This is their last chance. He curls his arms around Shiro's head, lifting him from the flowers, and kisses harder.

Something stirs. The petal is softer than skin, delicate but resilient. It cements them together, seals their lips and keeps them here. Shiro breathes out; Keith breathes in, tasting sweet flowers and Shiro.

"Keith?" Shiro whispers through the petal. His remaining arm comes around Keith's shoulders. "Keith."

Keith opens his mouth, waiting for the cough to shake him apart, but it doesn't come. He inhales, and the barbed, raked-up pain recedes and dwindles, retreating back along the branching paths of roots and vines. Shiro's hand is in Keith's hair, cradling his skull.

"Shiro," Keith manages to say. He tries to take another breath, and the pain eases more. Moment by moment, the threat of the cough ebbs farther away. The pain diminishes; Keith's eyes clear and his thoughts return. Shiro's face is mottled with petals and tears as he blinks up at Keith.

"What did you do?"

Keith clutches Shiro hard, burying his face in Shiro's neck, pulling him up out of the flower nest. 

"Needed you," he says. "Just needed you."

*

Later, Pidge will try to talk to Krolia about metamorphosis, the life-cycle of the Galra and the role of UV rays, color, and chlorophyll in that cycle. Allura will crouch beside the flowers and turn them over, reading them for magic as much as admiring their beauty. Beside her, Romelle will remind her of stories about Altean lovers, sick on pining, so overwhelmed by emotion that life rioted in their veins and around their bones.

Hunk and Lance will slap Shiro and Keith on the back; Lance will make a fairly crappy joke about Sleeping Beauty that doesn't make any sense but they all laugh at anyway.

Coran's going to cry, a big blubbering mess.

Just now, however, Keith and Shiro are still alone, breathing together, as everything changes and becomes exactly what it ought to be.


End file.
